Notes from the Charlotte Dujardin Clinic

Part one: Once in a Lifetime

“If you fall, it’s sand, you’ll bounce” – galloping a horse to create forward desire.

“Slap the rider, pat the horse”

Stages of training:

• First – Leg Yield
• Second – Shoulder-In
• Third – Travers

Straightness:

• Keep VERY straight.
• When too bendy on one side – straighten. On side that is less bendy – bend more.
• “He gets stuck because he’s not straight. The inside hind comes inside” (fix with shoulder-fore).

Forward:

• Forward/back in canter – allow the forward in the hand. Bring back enough to where the leg is on loose, the hand is on loose, and the rider just sits there without holding. SOFT.
• When you get the forward, have a loose leg. No clamping. Take leg off.
• Quality of canter improves just from forward. Create forward and use half-halts to re-balance.  Use forward/back transitions in gait.
• You want the horse thinking forward.
• If you have a lazy horse, legs off. A hot horse, legs on.
• To start work, Charlotte said she starts in canter instead of trot. Then works in trot after that. She said it makes the trot work looser and more supple, and it’s easier to get the engagement.

Stretchy Trot:

• Aid for stretching is low, wide rein. To pick the horse, hold hands higher and closer together.

Transitions:

• When too much hand, horse will be abrupt in transitions and fall on forehand.
• Transitions should look super smooth from canter forward to walk.
• Hind leg forward!
• No hands. Hands make horse shut down in transitions. It’s the last step of the transition where the horse was always shutting down (stutter step, or stopped completely).
• Transitions are so important. Need to be done right.
• Do LOADS of transitions (correctly).
• 1,000’s of transitions a ride. Not just a few, not a dozen, thousands a ride.

Leg Yield:

• Push the rib cage into the other rein.
• Can also do Leg Yield with counter flexion.
• When the horse is straight in the leg yield then the horse has to “Push” using his hind to move over. If too bent, the horse falls over and doesn’t get the strength benefit from the exercise.

Leg Yield in Canter:

• Good to teach horse to move away from leg sideways.
• The zig zag starter – 6 strides leg yield and 6 strides leg yield back. (broken down its 4 strides over, 1 straight, one change)
  • Easier to do this in leg yield to work out ‘how’ to do it. I believe she meant so rider can learn how to ride the zig zag without complicating it with half-pass.

 

At 7 years old, the horse should be able to do canter/walk/canter transitions in order to develop the muscles that will help with the sitting work. Transitions will help develop him.

Canter/walk/canter on a circle:

• Bad transitions: Gait too big for downward trans. Have to set the horse up. Canter has to be small and has to be on the hind leg and balanced.
• Round with soft hands.
• Keep energy
• Allow him to step forward into the walk when transitioning from canter to walk (too much hand causes horse to jerk or not step forward into the walk).
• Circle 10m helps collect the canter.
• Exercise: For the canter/walk transition, do a 10m circle along the wall, when coming back toward the wall again, ask for the downward transition. The wall acts like a half-halt, makes the horse back off or shift back. Makes it easier to get correct transition to walk without pulling.
• You need to have a really good canter/walk/canter transition, where horse is stepping forward into a walk, prior to teaching flying changes.

 

Shoulder-In:

• Active! Round and loose in hand. Want to see shoulders turn off the track.
• Not bent in neck, but flexion in the poll. Move the shoulders not the head and neck.
• When going to the right “Right Leg, Left Rein” mantra.
• Should stay in the angle you put him in.
• Do a test by counter flexing in Shoulder-in (should have a renvers feeling).
• Mantra for shoulder-In: Inside Leg to Outside Rein. Repeat.
• Shoulder-In is from the shoulders, not the rein.

Travers in Canter:

• A test to determine if your horse is supple. If he really bends. Do this before teaching, trying Half-Pass.
• Weight on inside
• Inside leg by girth, outside leg pushes hindquarters in.
• Do forward and back while IN travers (3 times down long side forward/back in HI).
  • Push hip in, then forward/back.
• If you can collect in canter Travers then it’s getting ready for canter pirouette.
• Do on 20 meter circle – round on outside. This is thinking pirouette without the massive strain. Way to build up to it.
• Then move between travers and Shoulder-Fore on 20m circle. Push quarters in and out to teach how to ride between both legs.

 

Collected Canter:

• Test it by pushing hands forward. Horse needs to stay in collected canter without rein. Push the hands straight forward, if horse speeds up or quits, then not right.
• Ask for collection and expect the horse to hold it.
• Don’t keep nagging/asking with each step.  Ask and expect the horse to hold it until asked for something else.
• Need to get collection in a soft way.

 

Flying Changes:

• Need to have a good quality canter/walk/canter BEFORE flying changes.
• If you don’t have a good canter/walk transitions then you’ll never have a good canter/halt transition.
• How to teach Flying Change:
  • Doesn’t teach in a wide open area (like diagonal)
  • Uses a figure 8 type exercise at one end.
  • 
  • This exercise uses the turn off in the corners to keep the horse engaged.
  • Most issues are a straightness issue.

Half-Pass:

• Keep the rhythm
• Shoulders move.
• Round and loose in the hand
• Rider has to position the horses body from the body and 2 reins, NOT the inside rein.

 

Pirouette:

• If pirouette whips around then it’s because horse is not off the riders inside leg..
• Exercise for pirouette:
  • Half-pass from the corner to X, X down center line in shoulder-fore  (to almost C) , then do 1/2 of a 10 m circle and half-pass back to X.
  • 
  • Make the half of a circle at the end smaller to increase difficulty (mimicking pirouette). Can get it to shoulder-fore down center, with large pirouette to end up at quarter line.
  • Always do different sizes so the horse can’t anticipate and rush.
  • Need to be able to come down the center line and not have the horse take over control in anticipation of pirouette.

Tips:

• The short side and the corner set up the next movement. A bad short side and corner leads to a bad movement.
• Short side is used to collect, activate, re-balance the horse.
• A horse at PSG should be able to collect on the spot. Shouldn’t need several strides to achieve it.
• Working Pirouette:
  • Hip in and do smaller and larger circles in traverse
• Rider hips to rider hands
• Keep the energy. Keep the work easy in order to keep the horse keen.
• ALWAYS outside straighter.
• Always do hard side first. Otherwise, have to do hard side after horse is already a bit more tired if doing it second.
• The leg is NOT there to keep him going. That’s the horse’s job.
• Activate the canter. Have to go forward in order to be able to collect.
• When the horse is strong, make that correction and then SOFTEN.
• Charlotte does stretch work and transitions dedicated days.

Other:

• Charlotte said she thinks all lazy horses should be police horses.
• Short  reins.
• Bum down – horse has to be in front of leg.
• Keep the rider’s upper body soft. The movement flows through the upper body.
• Let the horse make mistakes and then correct. Pat the horse for effort.
• Difference in what it takes for a horse to “sit” or to “push” i.e. passage is push. Horse is usually better in one than the other.
• The horse was jumping into a canter when asked for a more forward trot. Charlotte said “she canters because she’s on the forehand”. The horse couldn’t go forward, so broke into canter which is easier than actually pushing from behind to go forward.